


Don't be afraid (We're going home)

by GonerLoner



Series: vent fics [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Lonely Lance (Voltron), keith is a taxi cab driver, keith wants to take care of lance, lance is hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-16
Updated: 2018-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-23 21:06:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14340915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GonerLoner/pseuds/GonerLoner
Summary: A taxi cab, two young boys and a song on an average night in the city of dreams.Or maybe not so average.





	Don't be afraid (We're going home)

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by [twenty one pilots - taxi cab](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt9JasYUZD8/) (in this version).
> 
> was in the mood for another one-shot. i suggest listening to the song while reading. enjoy.

The air inside of the old taxi cab was cold as he opened the door, grunting a little as he sat, shutting the door against the rain and the annoying sounds of traffic from outside.

“Where’d you need to go?”, the driver asked him. Lance looked up, meeting his eyes in the driver’s mirror.

Purple-gray that looked black in the evening lights, dull with exhaustion and something else he couldn’t quite grab at this moment. But still relatively young.

He sighed, briefly closing his own eyes as pain shot through his side, his ribs aching from the way those jerks had been kicking him earlier.

He shouldn’t have taken that shortcut through that alley.

“Central Park, please.” He surely could walk home the rest of the way.

A nod, then the car awakened beneath him, rolling away from its place at the sidewalk and entering the traffic on the street. The driver didn’t seem to care about the tremor in his voice…or how pressed it was.

Well. It wasn’t like Lance expected him to.

The only reason he took a taxi was because he felt like he couldn’t take another step without some rest…and he sure as hell wouldn’t do that somewhere where they could find him again and hurt him even more. He needed to escape, and that lonely taxi cab had been his rescue.

Fuck. Taking a deep breath, he hissed quietly at how his chest ached…Fuck. What if one of his ribs was broken? Or fractured?

How would he survive a walk from Central Park to his home?

Nope, that-

His thoughts came to a halt as the cab drove through a road hole, sending a shockwave of pain through his body and he couldn’t help but letting out a muffled scream.

Shit, shit, shit, no, this wasn’t good…

“Are you okay?” He heard the driver talking like through thick fog.

He sounded worried…Lance wondered why. He wasn’t supposed to care.

Squeezing his eyes together, he tried to answer.

“Peachy.” His voice was scratchy. “Never been better.”

Silence from the front seat, then a sigh. The driver seemed to be watching him through the mirror, his eyebrows knitting together as Lance briefly looked again.

“If you say so…you don’t look so okay though.”

Lance gritted his teeth and was about to snap something back – because his patience was seriously wearing thin right now and how the hell did a stranger see how he was?? – but he held his tongue and just continued looking out of the window, clutching his side a bit as he watched the nightly city passing by and closing his eyes as soft music suddenly drifted through the car.

“You don’t mind me turning on the radio, right?” The driver’s voice had gotten quieter. His voice was actually quite nice.

If Lance wouldn’t have been so beaten up right now, he’d probably try to gather up some energy and courage to talk with him. It had been some time that he had been talking to someone his age.

But it was late, pitch black darkness outside, only lightened by the numerous city lights, so he just managed a simple “no, no.”

The song the driver had chosen was actually a quite good one. Really gentle. Just the kind of music he would listen to during this time of the night.

He thought he knew that voice from somewhere…

Did he already hear another song with that voice?

Probably not. It was just a déjà vu…

_Sometimes we will die and sometimes we will fly away…Either way  
You’re by my side until my dying day._

_And if I’m not there and I’m far away, I said “Don’t be afraid…”; I said  
“Don’t be afraid…We’re going home.”_

Together with that piano sounds…

It brought tears to his eyes.

Why was he so lonely? So alone?

He just wanted another person to talk to…another person who looked out for him when he couldn’t look out for himself any more.

Probably someone who saved him from getting beaten up like today.

Lance didn’t even realize he was crying until a soft sob left his lips and he squeezed his eyes shut again. He just wanted this day to end…just wanted to lay in bed and forget about anything that happened today.

He still didn’t know what to do about his aching and probably broken ribs…but he would cross that bridge when he got there.

Several minutes later, the car came to a hold.

“We’re there.” The driver’s voice startled him out of his thoughts and as Lance looked outside, they were indeed standing a few feet away from the entrance of Central Park.

“Thank you”, he quietly answered, wiping his eyes a bit and digging through his pockets to find some money.

The young man was obviously watching him, because he started talking again. “Do you live here?”

Lance stopped in his search to look up. “Yeah, well, not really…I still have to walk for about fifteen minutes.”

He saw a black eyebrow slowly lifting. “Now? In the dark? In that state you’re in?”

“Do you wanna say I’m weak?”, he snapped back. Why was that driver acting like…like he cared?! Nobody ever cared what Lance looked like…nobody cared if he looked like he was close to dying. Nobody ever did.

And now, these words that probably have been meant in kindness sounded like mockery to him.

The driver sighed. “No, I…listen, I can see that you’re hurt and yes, you don’t know me, but you probably need to get to a hospital.” A brief pause. “I’ll drive you there…you don’t have to pay me.”

Lance looked away, not answering as once again tears were burning behind his eyes. “I can’t afford a hospital”, he admitted very quietly.

Curse his debts, his college and his inabilities of making money.

He had barely enough to afford his shitty apartment and food…and even there only the necessities.

Silence for a few moments.

Then, the young driver sighed again, turning around to finally look directly at Lance and as the boy looked up again, he was taking aback by the sudden intensity in the driver’s eyes.

“I can take care of that”, he answered quietly. “Just…you really don’t look good and I don’t want you to die here.”

Lance blinked.

The boy looked barely older than he himself…how would he be able to pay a hospital bill if Lance’s ribs needed to be stitched up again – or some more, he had no idea what else had been damaged because of all these kicks…

But he didn’t have any more time to wonder because the driver apparently took his silence as an agreement and turned around again, starting the engine and leaving the pitch-black street, getting back into the nightly traffic.

Lance exhaled in a shuddering breath and leaned back again, closing his eyes.

“My ribs are…probably broken”, he admitted. “I don’t want you to spend so much money on me though…I don’t even know your name.”

“Keith.” A smile was evident in the young driver’s voice. “And I already said I can take care of that. It’s…you seem like someone I once knew. I want to help you.”

And he sounded so sincere that Lance couldn’t help but believe him. Still, he felt bad for letting someone else paying such amounts of money for him…

“Don’t be afraid.” And then Keith was humming softly, quietly singing the lines of the song they had been listening to earlier.

_“And if I’m not there and I’m far away, I said ‘don’t be afraid’… I said ‘don’t be afraid, we’re going home.”_


End file.
